Tuesday, April 01, 2008
APRIL (SPACE) FOOLS
The crew launch vehicle, "Ares I," of NASA's post-shuttle manned program, "Constellation," is nearing a watershed. For months, word has been out that there is a fundamental problem with Ares I: The design has an inherent mechanical vibration problem, a shaking so severe that it would kill the crew riding atop the rocket, even if the rocket and spacecraft could survive the vibration. A report in AvLeak yesterday puts out the official NASA line that the problem is fixable.
Others don't buy this. Here's one blogger's view that seems pretty well informed:
... ARES 1 will not be able to lift itself off the ground. The latest attempts to dampen its inherent oscillatory modes are falling far short of the goal. Additional weight is required just to strengthen the basic structure of the rocket to withstand the rigors of the rocking and rolling being generated by the solid rocket motor. That weight is being added even before the dampers are added to keep the crew within the Orion capsule (itself drastically overweight) from suffering unrecoverable damage to their chest cavities and bladders caused by the rocket's natural frequencies aligning with those of the vital organs.
More and more engineers are coming to realize that ARES 1 has become unviable as the crew launch system. ...
You will soon start to see the results of this calamity become more evident as apparently disconnected scapegoats are constructed to cover for ARES/Orion misfortunes. Late external tanks for the shuttle will delay the Hubble repair mission deep into the fall. Until that mission is completed, and the need for a back-up rescue launch is put to bed, the launch facilities at KSC can not be modified to accommodate ARES test flights. An unnecessary swap to a new launch abort system, the ill-contrived MLAS, will cause a one-year redesign cycle to collect wind tunnel data and to buy time for ARES 1. Already in hand for ALAS, this data needs to be regenerated to determine the loads on the integrated launch vehicle. All of which makes this look pretty foolish, indeed.
GB, THHotA
posted by Greg 5:04 PM
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